In the earnings call today from Apple, new CEO John Ternus mentioned its collaboration with the Philippine market, specifically the Department of Education. The DepEd will be able to distribute 170,000 MacBook Neo devices to teachers around the country to more than 16,000 K-12 schools across the country.
After we published this news, our comments section was flooded with commentary asking why the Neo per se and not the MacBook Air, and more specifically, why Apple when in fact there are already existing partnerships with Microsoft.
Inspired by Malaysia
I’m going to attempt to answer these questions, after beholding a similar program that has matured with the public school sector in Malaysia.
Back in August, I was able to attend an Apple Education conference in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. These were hands-on and candid discussions on the future of education with the rise of AI tools, accessibility to technology across South East Asia, and device parental controls for children.
Part of that immersion was an observation session at SBPI Gombak, a public boarding school located at the fringes of Kuala Lumpur. The campus is one of 70 schools that have embraced a partnership with Apple Education, which means that the devices alone are merely half the picture. If we are to follow the same trail it seems that our government aims to fully integrate whatever learning management system (LMS) appropriate for schools.
Three reasons for the collaboration
The first reason is preference. There is a study that shows how Apple is the preferred ecosystem for educators, at 89% favorability in a survey of 20-25,000 students.
The next reason is because Apple owns both the hardware and the software and it has 100% control of the educational experience which means that teacher training is very specific. The earnings call did mention that access to the Neo laptops will also come with over 70 lesson plans but hopefully, these can plant the seeds to developing a more interactive and impactful curriculum in this first seed.
The third reason is actually practical: cost. The MacBook Neo is a bang-for-your-buck educational device running on an A18 Pro Chip. On that level, it’s very hard to find a more affordable device vis-a-vis performance given the increase in the price of RAM and SSD this 2026. Macs historically also last for a very long time. Anecdotally, MacBook units can survive more than a decade of wear and tear and still be useful.
It seems that this effort with Apple is part of the DCP or the DepEd Computerization Program. We are hoping that this can be a start to push forward student learning and more importantly, a sense of agency and ownership.